Various designs for night light devices have been suggested. Included among the concerns in the design of night lights have been: convenience (in terms of installation and use), effective illumination, safety, and aesthetics. In addition, a continued concern with the use of night light devices in motels, restaurants, and other public places has been theft or vandalism of the night light device or the illuminated portion thereof. Although designs have been suggested for addressing one or some of these concerns, no single approach has sufficiently addressed all concerns. Therefore, there exists room for further improvement in the design of illuminated wall switch/outlet devices.
Conventional night lights, such as the one described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,931,911 comprise an electric lamp which is plugged directly into an electrical wall outlet. These types of night light devices have the drawback that the functionality of one or both of the outlets on a standard duplex wall receptacle is lost when the night light is engaged with the outlet.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,481,442 ('442), issued to Dickie et al., discloses a night light for a standard duplex wall outlet. The night light assembly disclosed in '442 includes a cover plate that has "power blades" which engage one socket of the wall outlet. Although configurations are disclosed to maintain functionality of the non-engaged outlet, the device does not allow for functionality of the engaged outlet.
In an attempt to maintain the functionality of the wall outlet assembly, U.S. Pat. No. 4,000,405, issued to Horwinski discloses a combined electrical receptacle type adapter and night light. However, the unit attached to the wall switch outlet undesirably extends from the standard outlet, and includes increased circuitry for operation of the bulb members.
Another design for a wall outlet is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,617,613, issued to Rice. The '613 patent discloses an electrical outlet cover plate having an illuminating device fastened to the cover plate with an adhesive. The patent also discloses the use of tentacular electrical conductors which make contact with the heads of the feed and ground terminals and/or ground bracket. The contact design supplies electrical power to the illuminating device mounted on the cover plate. Although such a design allows for maintained functionality of the outlet sockets, and claims ease of installation, it does have drawbacks. The illuminated portion of the device protrudes from the cover plate, which is an unfavorable since it increases the risk of vandalism of theft of the illuminated housing, and interferes with the external flat contour of the face plate. Also, the hardware for contacting the terminals carrying electric potential does not adequately account for some types of variations in terminal location designs, so the unit could not be conveniently used with some types of wall outlets. Also, the unit does not address illumination of wall switches.
In the case of wall switches, the choices for night light illumination is further limited. The illumination of the knob region has been suggested as in U.S. Pat. No. 3,968,356. Also, designs utilizing a light-emitting diode as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,755,913 ('913), have been suggested. The light-emitting diode in this device extends through a hole in the switch wall plate, and illuminates only a small region of the switch plate. These designs do not afford substantial illumination of the wall switch.
It is among the objects of the present invention to address problems and limitations of prior art approaches to illumination of wall switch/outlet devices.